Edgar Degas Biography (Artist) Best known as: 19th century French painter of ballet dancers Name at birth: Hilaire Germain Edgar De Gas Edgar Degas was a 19th century artist from France who is best known for paintings, pastels and drawings of dancers, women at the toilette and Parisian street scenes. The product of a wealthy Parisian banking family, Degas studied art extensively and became a master draftsman by the 1860s. Although his style was more realistic and naturalistic, he joined the Impressionist school ( Claude Monet , Henri Matisse , et al) for exhibitions -- and has historically been linked to them aesthetically. Degas was known to have done hundreds of drawings before committing to a painting, and he experimented with media throughout his career. Some of his most famous paintings include Woman with Chrysanthemums (1865), The Dance Class (1873-76), L'Absinthe (1876) and After the Bath (1898). His sculptures from later in his career -- lots of dancers -- are seen all over the world.

Extra credit: He was friends with and helped the career of Mary Cassatt … His last name is pronounced “deh-GAH.” Copyright © 1998-2017 by Who2?, LLC. All rights reserved. Advertisement Advertisement Edgar Degas on ArtStack - art online /ˈdeɪɡɑː/ ; born Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas, French: [ilɛːʁ ʒɛʁmɛ̃ ɛdɡaʁ də ɡɑ] ; 19 July 1834 – 27 September 1917) was a French artist famous for his paintings, sculptures, prints , and drawings. He is especially identified with the subject of dance; more than half of his works depict dancers. He is regarded as one of the founders of Impressionism , although he rejected the term, preferring to be called a realist . [1] He was a superb draftsman , and particularly masterly in depicting movement, as can be seen in his rendition of dancers, racecourse subjects and female nudes . His portraits are notable for their psychological complexity and for their portrayal of human isolation.

[2] At the beginning of his career, Degas wanted to be a history painter , a calling for which he was well prepared by his rigorous academic training and close study of classic art. In his early thirties, he changed course, and by bringing the traditional methods of a history painter to bear on contemporary subject matter, he became a classical painter of modern life. [3] Contents Early life[ edit ] Edgar Degas c. 1855–60 [4] Degas was born in Paris, France, into a moderately wealthy family. He was the oldest of five children of Célestine Musson De Gas, a Creole from New Orleans , Louisiana , and Augustin De Gas, a banker. His maternal grandfather Germain Musson, was born in Port-au-Prince , Haiti of French descent and had settled in New Orleans in 1810. [5] Degas (he adopted this less grandiose spelling of his family name when he became an adult) [6] began his schooling at age eleven, enrolling in the Lycée Louis-le-Grand . His mother died when he was thirteen, and his father and grandfather became the main influences on him for the remainder of his youth.

Degas began to paint early in life. By the time he graduated from the Lycée with a baccalauréat in literature in 1853, at age 18, he had turned a room in his home into an artist's studio. Upon graduating, he registered as a copyist in The Louvre Museum, but his father expected him to go to law school . Degas duly enrolled at the Faculty of Law of the University of Paris in November 1853, but applied little effort to his studies. In 1855 he met Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres , whom Degas revered and whose advice he never forgot: "Draw lines, young man, and still more lines, both from life and from memory, and you will become a good artist." [7] In April of that year Degas was admitted to the École des Beaux-Arts . He studied drawing there with Louis Lamothe , under whose guidance he flourished, following the style of Ingres. [8] In July 1856, Degas traveled to Italy, where he would remain for the next three years.

In 1858, while staying with his aunt's family in Naples , he made the first studies for his early masterpiece The Bellelli Family . He also drew and painted numerous copies of works by Michelangelo , Raphael , Titian , and other Renaissance artists, but—contrary to conventional practice—he usually selected from an altarpiece a detail that had caught his attention: a secondary figure, or a head which he treated as a portrait. [9] Artistic career[ edit ] Upon his return to France in 1859 Degas moved into a Paris studio large enough to permit him to begin painting The Bellelli Family—an imposing canvas he intended for exhibition in the Salon , although it remained unfinished until 1867. He also began work on several history paintings : Alexander and Bucephalus and The Daughter of Jephthah in 1859–60; Sémiramis Building Babylon in 1860; and Young Spartans around 1860. [10] In 1861 Degas visited his childhood friend Paul Valpinçon in Normandy , and made the earliest of his many studies of horses.

He exhibited at the Salon for the first time in 1865, when the jury accepted his painting Scene of War in the Middle Ages, which attracted little attention. [11] Although he exhibited annually in the Salon during the next five years, he submitted no more history paintings, and his Steeplechase—The Fallen Jockey (Salon of 1866) signaled his growing commitment to contemporary subject matter. The change in his art was influenced primarily by the example of Édouard Manet , whom Degas had met in 1864 (while both were copying the same Velázquez portrait in the Louvre, according to a story that may be apocryphal). [12] Upon the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War in 1870, Degas enlisted in the National Guard, where his defense of Paris left him little time for painting. During rifle training his eyesight was found to be defective, and for the rest of his life his eye problems were a constant worry to him.

[13] A Cotton Office in New Orleans , 1873 After the war, Degas began in 1872 an extended stay in New Orleans , Louisiana , where his brother René and a number of other relatives lived. Staying at the home of his Creole uncle, Michel Musson, on Esplanade Avenue , [14] Degas produced a number of works, many depicting family members. One of Degas's New Orleans works, A Cotton Office in New Orleans , garnered favorable attention back in France, and was his only work purchased by a museum (the Pau ) during his lifetime. Degas returned to Paris in 1873 and his father died the following year, whereupon Degas learned that his brother René had amassed enormous business debts. To preserve his family's reputation, Degas sold his house and an art collection he had inherited, and used the money to pay off his brother's debts. Dependent for the first time in his life on sales of his artwork for income, he produced much of his greatest work during the decade beginning in 1874.

[15] Disenchanted by now with the Salon, he instead joined a group of young artists who were organizing an independent exhibiting society. The group soon became known as the Impressionists. Between 1874 and 1886 they mounted eight art shows, known as the Impressionist Exhibitions. Degas took a leading role in organizing the exhibitions, and showed his work in all but one of them, despite his persistent conflicts with others in the group. He had little in common with Monet and the other landscape painters in the group, whom he mocked for painting outdoors. Conservative in his social attitudes, he abhorred the scandal created by the exhibitions, as well as the publicity and advertising that his colleagues sought. [1] He also deeply disliked being associated with the term "Impressionist", which the press had coined and popularized, and insisted on including non-Impressionist artists such as Jean-Louis Forain and Jean-François Raffaëlli in the group's exhibitions. The resulting rancor within the group contributed to its disbanding in 1886.

[16] As his financial situation improved through sales of his own work, he was able to indulge his passion for collecting works by artists he admired: old masters such as El Greco and such contemporaries as Manet , Pissarro , Cézanne , Gauguin , Van Gogh , and Édouard Brandon . Three artists he idolized, Ingres , Delacroix , and Daumier , were especially well represented in his collection. [17] In the late 1880s, Degas also developed a passion for photography. [18] He photographed many of his friends, often by lamplight, as in his double portrait of Renoir and Mallarmé . Other photographs, depicting dancers and nudes, were used for reference in some of Degas's drawings and paintings. [19] As the years passed, Degas became isolated, due in part to his belief that a painter could have no personal life. [20] The Dreyfus Affair controversy brought his anti-Semitic leanings to the fore and he broke with all his Jewish friends.

[21] His argumentative nature was deplored by Renoir, who said of him: "What a creature he was, that Degas! All his friends had to leave him; I was one of the last to go, but even I couldn't stay till the end." [22] Although he is known to have been working in pastel as late as the end of 1907, and is believed to have continued making sculptures as late as 1910, he apparently ceased working in 1912, when the impending demolition of his longtime residence on the rue Victor Massé forced him to move to quarters on Boulevard de Clichy . [23] He never married and spent the last years of his life, nearly blind, restlessly wandering the streets of Paris before dying in September 1917. [24] The Dance Class (La Classe de Danse) , 1873–1876, oil on canvas, by Edgar Degas Degas is often identified as an Impressionist , an understandable but insufficient description.

Impressionism originated in the 1860s and 1870s and grew, in part, from the realism of such painters as Courbet and Corot . The Impressionists painted the realities of the world around them using bright, "dazzling" colors, concentrating primarily on the effects of light, and hoping to infuse their scenes with immediacy. They wanted to express what they saw in that exact moment. Technically, Degas differs from the Impressionists in that he continually belittled their practice of painting en plein air . [25] "He was often as anti-impressionist as the critics who reviewed the shows", according to art historian Carol Armstrong; as Degas himself explained, "no art was ever less spontaneous than mine. What I do is the result of reflection and of the study of the great masters; of inspiration, spontaneity, temperament, I know nothing." [26] Nonetheless, he is described more accurately as an Impressionist than as a member of any other movement.

His scenes of Parisian life, his off-center compositions, his experiments with color and form, and his friendship with several key Impressionist artists—most notably Mary Cassatt and Édouard Manet —all relate him intimately to the Impressionist movement. [27] Degas's style reflects his deep respect for the old masters (he was an enthusiastic copyist well into middle age) [28] and his great admiration for Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres and Eugène Delacroix . He was also a collector of Japanese prints , whose compositional principles influenced his work, as did the vigorous realism of popular illustrators such as Daumier and Gavarni . Although famous for horses and dancers, Degas began with conventional historical paintings such as The Daughter of Jephthah (c.1859–61) and The Young Spartans (c.1860–62), in which his gradual progress toward a less idealized treatment of the figure is already apparent.

During his early career, Degas also painted portraits of individuals and groups; an example of the latter is The Bellelli Family (c.1858–67), a brilliantly composed and psychologically poignant portrayal of his aunt, her husband, and their children. In this painting, as in The Young Spartans and many later works, Degas was drawn to the tensions present between men and women. In his early paintings, Degas already evidenced the mature style that he would later develop more fully by cropping subjects awkwardly and by choosing unusual viewpoints. L'Absinthe , 1876, oil on canvas, by Edgar Degas By the late 1860s Degas had shifted from his initial forays into history painting to an original observation of contemporary life. Racecourse scenes provided an opportunity to depict horses and their riders in a modern context. He began to paint women at work, milliners and laundresses . Mlle. Fiocre in the Ballet La Source, exhibited in the Salon of 1868, was his first major work to introduce a subject with which he would become especially identified, dancers.

[29] In many subsequent paintings dancers were shown backstage or in rehearsal, emphasizing their status as professionals doing a job. From 1870 Degas increasingly painted ballet subjects, partly because they sold well and provided him with needed income after his brother's debts had left the family bankrupt. [30] Degas began to paint café life as well, in works such as L'Absinthe and Singer with a Glove. His paintings often hinted at narrative content in a way that was highly ambiguous; for example, Interior (which has also been called The Rape) has presented a conundrum to art historians in search of a literary source— Thérèse Raquin has been suggested [31] —but it may be a depiction of prostitution. [32] As his subject matter changed, so, too, did Degas's technique. The dark palette that bore the influence of Dutch painting gave way to the use of vivid colors and bold brushstrokes. Paintings such as Place de la Concorde read as "snapshots," freezing moments of time to portray them accurately, imparting a sense of movement.

The lack of color in the 1874 Ballet Rehearsal on Stage and the 1876 The Ballet Instructor can be said to link with his interest in the new technique of photography. The changes to his palette, brushwork, and sense of composition all evidence the influence that both the Impressionist movement and modern photography, with its spontaneous images and off-kilter angles, had on his work. [27] Place de la Concorde , 1875, oil on canvas, by Edgar Degas, Hermitage Museum , St. Petersburg Blurring the distinction between portraiture and genre pieces, he painted his bassoonist friend, Désiré Dihau, in The Orchestra of the Opera (1868–69) as one of fourteen musicians in an orchestra pit, viewed as though by a member of the audience. Above the musicians can be seen only the legs and tutus of the dancers onstage, their figures cropped by the edge of the painting.

Art historian Charles Stuckey has compared the viewpoint to that of a distracted spectator at a ballet, and says that "it is Degas' fascination with the depiction of movement, including the movement of a spectator's eyes as during a random glance, that is properly speaking 'Impressionist'." [33] Musicians in the Orchestra, 1872, oil on canvas, by Edgar Degas Degas's mature style is distinguished by conspicuously unfinished passages, even in otherwise tightly rendered paintings. He frequently blamed his eye troubles for his inability to finish, an explanation that met with some skepticism from colleagues and collectors who reasoned, as Stuckey explains, that "his pictures could hardly have been executed by anyone with inadequate vision". [13] The artist provided another clue when he described his predilection "to begin a hundred things and not finish one of them", [34] and was in any case notoriously reluctant to consider a painting complete. His interest in portraiture led Degas to study carefully the ways in which a person's social stature or form of employment may be revealed by their physiognomy , posture, dress, and other attributes.

In his 1879 Portraits, At the Stock Exchange , he portrayed a group of Jewish businessmen with a hint of anti-Semitism. In 1881 he exhibited two pastels, Criminal Physiognomies, that depicted juvenile gang members recently convicted of murder in the "Abadie Affair". Degas had attended their trial with sketchbook in hand, and his numerous drawings of the defendants reveal his interest in the atavistic features thought by some 19th-century scientists to be evidence of innate criminality. [35] In his paintings of dancers and laundresses, he reveals their occupations not only by their dress and activities but also by their body type: his ballerinas exhibit an athletic physicality, while his laundresses are heavy and solid. [36] At the Races, 1877–1880, oil on canvas, by Edgar Degas, Musée d'Orsay , Paris By the later 1870s Degas had mastered not only the traditional medium of oil on canvas , but pastel as well.

The dry medium, which he applied in complex layers and textures, enabled him more easily to reconcile his facility for line with a growing interest in expressive color. In the mid-1870s he also returned to the medium of etching , which he had neglected for ten years. At first he was guided in this by his old friend Ludovic-Napoléon Lepic , himself an innovator in its use, and began experimenting with lithography and monotype . [37] He produced some 300 monotypes over two periods, from the mid-1870s to the mid-1880s and again in the early 1890s. [38] He was especially fascinated by the effects produced by monotype and frequently reworked the printed images with pastel. [37] By 1880, sculpture had become one more strand to Degas's continuing endeavor to explore different media, although the artist displayed only one sculpture publicly during his lifetime. La Toilette (Woman Combing Her Hair), c. 1884–1886, pastel on paper, by Edgar Degas, Hermitage Museum , St.

Petersburg These changes in media engendered the paintings that Degas would produce in later life. Degas began to draw and paint women drying themselves with towels, combing their hair, and bathing (see: After the Bath, Woman drying herself ). The strokes that model the form are scribbled more freely than before; backgrounds are simplified. The meticulous naturalism of his youth gave way to an increasing abstraction of form. Except for his characteristically brilliant draftsmanship and obsession with the figure, the pictures created in this late period of his life bear little superficial resemblance to his early paintings. Ironically, it is these paintings, created late in his life, and after the heyday of the Impressionist movement, that most obviously use the coloristic techniques of Impressionism. [39] For all the stylistic evolution, certain features of Degas's work remained the same throughout his life. He always painted indoors, preferring to work in his studio , either from memory, photographs, or live models. [40] The figure remained his primary subject; his few landscapes were produced from memory or imagination. It was not unusual for him to repeat a subject many times, varying the composition or treatment.

He was a deliberative artist whose works, as Andrew Forge has written, "were prepared, calculated, practiced, developed in stages. They were made up of parts. The adjustment of each part to the whole, their linear arrangement, was the occasion for infinite reflection and experiment." [41] Degas himself explained, "In art, nothing should look like chance, not even movement". [30] Video Postcard: The Millinery Shop (1879/86) on YouTube , Art Institute of Chicago Degas's only showing of sculpture during his life took place in 1881 when he exhibited The Little Dancer of Fourteen Years . A nearly life-size wax figure with real hair and dressed in a cloth tutu, it provoked a strong reaction from critics, most of whom found its realism extraordinary but denounced the dancer as ugly. [42] In a review, J.-K. Huysmans wrote: "The terrible reality of this statuette evidently produces uneasiness in the spectators; all their notions about sculpture, about those cold inanimate whitenesses ... are here overturned.

The fact is that with his first attempt Monsieur Degas has revolutionized the traditions of sculpture as he has long since shaken the conventions of painting." [43] Degas created a substantial number of other sculptures during a span of four decades, but they remained unseen by the public until a posthumous exhibition in 1918. Neither The Little Dancer of Fourteen Years nor any of Degas's other sculptures were cast in bronze during the artist's lifetime. [42] Degas scholars have agreed that the sculptures were not created as aids to painting, although the artist habitually explored ways of linking graphic art and oil painting, drawing and pastel, sculpture and photography. Degas assigned the same significance to sculpture as to drawing: "Drawing is a way of thinking, modelling another". [30] After Degas's death, his heirs found in his studio 150 wax sculptures, many in disrepair. They consulted foundry owner Adrien Hébrard, who concluded that 74 of the waxes could be cast in bronze.

It is assumed that, except for the Little Dancer Aged Fourteen, all Degas bronzes worldwide are cast from surmoulages ( fr ) (i.e., cast from bronze masters). A surmoulage bronze is a bit smaller, and shows less surface detail, than its original bronze mold. The Hébrard Foundry cast the bronzes from 1919 until 1936, and closed down in 1937, shortly before Hébrard's death. In 2004, a little-known group of 73 plaster casts, more or less closely resembling Degas's original wax sculptures, was presented as having been discovered among the materials bought by the Airaindor Foundry (later known as Airaindor-Valsuani) from Hébrard's descendants. Bronzes cast from these plasters were issued between 2004 and 2016 by Airaindor-Valsuani in editions inconsistently marked and thus of unknown size. There has been substantial controversy concerning the authenticity of these plasters as well as the circumstances and date of their creation as proposed by their promoters.

[42] [44] While several museum and academic professionals accept them as presented, most of the recognized Degas scholars have declined to comment. [45] [46] Personality and politics[ edit ] Self-portrait (photograph), c. 1895 Degas, who believed that "the artist must live alone, and his private life must remain unknown", [47] lived an outwardly uneventful life. In company he was known for his wit, which could often be cruel. He was characterized as an "old curmudgeon" by the novelist George Moore , [47] and he deliberately cultivated his reputation as a misanthropic bachelor. [22] Profoundly conservative in his political opinions, he opposed all social reforms and found little to admire in such technological advances as the telephone. He fired a model upon learning she was Protestant . [47] Although Degas painted a number of Jewish subjects from 1865 to 1870, his anti-Semitism became apparent by the mid-1870s.

His 1879 painting Portraits at the Stock Exchange is widely regarded as anti-Semitic, with the facial features of the banker taken directly from the anti-Semitic cartoons rampant in Paris at the time. [48] The Dreyfus Affair , which divided Paris from the 1890s to the early 1900s, further intensified his anti-Semitism. By the mid-1890s, he had broken off relations with all of his Jewish friends, [21] publicly disavowed his previous friendships with Jewish artists, and refused to use models who he believed might be Jewish. He remained an outspoken anti-Semite and member of the anti-Semitic "Anti-Dreyfusards" until his death. [49] Dancers, 1900, Princeton University Art Museum During his life, public reception of Degas's work ranged from admiration to contempt. As a promising artist in the conventional mode, Degas had a number of paintings accepted in the Salon between 1865 and 1870. These works received praise from Pierre Puvis de Chavannes and the critic Jules-Antoine Castagnary .

[50] He soon joined forces with the Impressionists, however, and rejected the rigid rules, judgments, and elitism of the Salon—just as the Salon and general public initially rejected the experimentalism of the Impressionists. Degas's work was controversial, but was generally admired for its draftsmanship. His La Petite Danseuse de Quatorze Ans , or Little Dancer of Fourteen Years, which he displayed at the sixth Impressionist exhibition in 1881, was probably his most controversial piece; some critics decried what they thought its "appalling ugliness" while others saw in it a "blossoming". [51] In part Degas' originality consisted in disregarding the smooth, full surfaces and contours of classical sculpture ... [and] in garnishing his little statue with real hair and clothing made to scale like the accoutrements for a doll. These relatively "real" additions heightened the illusion, but they also posed searching questions, such as what can be referred to as "real" when art is concerned.

[52] The suite of pastels depicting nudes that Degas exhibited in the eighth Impressionist Exhibition in 1886 produced "the most concentrated body of critical writing on the artist during his lifetime ... The overall reaction was positive and laudatory". [53] Recognized as an important artist in his lifetime, Degas is now considered "one of the founders of Impressionism". [54] Though his work crossed many stylistic boundaries, his involvement with the other major figures of Impressionism and their exhibitions, his dynamic paintings and sketches of everyday life and activities, and his bold color experiments, served to finally tie him to the Impressionist movement as one of its greatest artists. Although Degas had no formal pupils, he greatly influenced several important painters, most notably Jean-Louis Forain , Mary Cassatt , and Walter Sickert ; [55] his greatest admirer may have been Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec . [56] Degas's paintings, pastels, drawings, and sculptures are on prominent display in many museums, and have been the subject of many museum exhibitions and retrospectives.

Recent exhibitions include Degas: Drawings and Sketchbooks (The Morgan Library , 2010); Picasso Looks at Degas ( Museu Picasso de Barcelona, 2010); Degas and the Nude ( Museum of Fine Arts, Boston , 2011); Degas' Method ( Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek , 2013); and Degas's Little Dancer ( National Gallery of Art , Washington D.C., 2014). Sources[ edit ] Armstrong, Carol (1991). Odd Man Out: Readings of the Work and Reputation of Edgar Degas. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. ISBN 0-226-02695-7 Auden, W.H.; Kronenberger, Louis (1966), The Viking Book of Aphorisms, New York: Viking Press Bade, Patrick; Degas, Edgar (1992). Degas. London: Studio Editions. ISBN 1-85170-845-6 Baumann, Felix Andreas; Boggs, Jean Sutherland; Degas, Edgar; and Karabelnik, Marianne (1994).

Degas Portraits. London: Merrell Holberton. ISBN 1-85894-014-1 Benedek, Nelly S. (2004). "Chronology of the Artist's Life" . Metropolitan Museum of Art. Archived from the original on 2 May 2006. Retrieved 6 May 2006. Benedek, Nelly S. (2004). "Degas's Artistic Style" . Metropolitan Museum of Art. Archived from the original on 12 November 2006. Retrieved 6 May 2006. Bowness, Alan. ed. (1965) "Edgar Degas." The Book of Art Volume 7. New York: Grolier Incorporated :41. Brettell, Richard R.; McCullagh, Suzanne Folds (1984). Degas in The Art Institute of Chicago. New York: The Art Institute of Chicago and Harry N. Abrams, Inc. ISBN 0-86559-058-3 Brown, Marilyn (1994).

Degas and the Business of Art: a Cotton Office in New Orleans. Pennsylvania State University Press. ISBN 0-271-00944-6 Canaday, John (1969). The Lives of the Painters Volume 3. New York: W.W. Norton and Company Inc. Dorra, Henri. Art in Perspective New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc.:208 Dumas, Ann (1988). Degas's Mlle. Fiocre in Context. Brooklyn: The Brooklyn Museum. ISBN 0-87273-116-2 Dunlop, Ian (1979). Degas. New York, N.Y: Harper & Row. OCLC 5583005 "Edgar Degas, 1834–1917." The Book of Art Volume III (1976). New York: Grolier Incorporated:4. Gordon, Robert; Forge, Andrew (1988). Degas. New York: Harry N. Abrams.

ISBN 0-8109-1142-6 Growe, Bernd; Edgar Degas (1992). Edgar Degas, 1834–1917. Cologne: Benedikt Taschen. ISBN 3-8228-0560-2 Guillaud, Jaqueline; Guillaud, Maurice (editors) (1985). Degas: Form and Space. New York: Rizzoli. ISBN 0-8478-5407-8 Hartt, Frederick (1976). "Degas" Art Volume 2. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall Inc.: 365. "Impressionism." Praeger Encyclopedia of Art Volume 3 (1967). New York: Praeger Publishers: 952.

1000+ images about Artist/Edgar Degas on Pinterest | Stockings, Photographs and Degas paintings Pinterest • The world’s catalog of ideas Artist/Edgar Degas Edgar Degas (born Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas, 19 July 1834 – 27 September 1917), was a French artist famous for his work in painting, sculpture, printmaking and drawing. He is regarded as one of the founders of Impressionism although he rejected the term, and preferred to be called a realist. A superb draftsman, he is especially identified with the subject of dance, and over half of his works depict dancers. These display his mastery in the depiction of movement, as do his racecourse subjects. 6 Pins1.44k Followers 1000+ images about Art - Edgar Degas on Pinterest | Edgar degas, Dancers and Degas drawings Pinterest • The world’s catalog of ideas Art - Edgar Degas Edgar Degas, was a French artist famous for his work in painting, sculpture, printmaking and drawing.

He is regarded as one of the founders of Impressionism although he rejected the term, and preferred to be called a realist. Born: July 19, 1834, Paris, Died: September 27, 1917, Paris. Wikipedia 306 Pins641 Followers Edgar Degas Paintings - Dancers, Ballet, Oil Painting Reproduction Summary Toperfect Art supplies Edgar Degas biography and painting knowledge, which is useful for painters and art fans. Our art gallery not only supply high-quality oil painting reproduction of Degas artwork for sale, but also tell you story about these famous paintings and impressionist style. The famous artists in our art company are good at on canvas reproductions of Degas Dancers and other beautiful painting wholesale such as At the Races , horses racing, ballet, and dancers. Edgar Degas Paintings Pastel Painting * Charcoal Drawing * Pencil Sketch * Wax Crayon Painting All of Degas drawings can be ordered as reproductions of oil painting, acrylic painting, and watercolor painting for wall decor.

You're welcome to send your own images of the famous artist to us to paint by hand as painting from photos, which is more artistic collection than those Edgar Degas prints and posters made by machinery. You're allowed to download the painter Degas pictures from Toperfect's website as wallpapers. The copyright of scripts in this website is owned by Toperfect. Toperfect reserves the manual scripts of original version. Toperfect will take appropriate legal action in the piracy and infringements of copyright. French Impressionist painter, engraver, lithographer, printmaker, pastellist, draftsman, photographer & sculptor born 19 July 1834 - died 27 September 1917 Also known as: Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas, Edgar Degas, Degas Edgar, Hilaire-Germain-Edgar Degas, Hilaire Germain Edgar De Gas. Friend of: Giovanni Boldini (1842-1931), Gustave Moreau (1826-1898). Degas was born in Paris on the 19th of July 1834. is a French Impressionist painter and sculptor.

The most famous Degas paintings are dealing with ballet dancers , women dancers and racing horses . Generally, he is regarded as an Impressionist, but some of Degas ballerina are with more features of Classicism, Realism and Romanticism. In 1862, he began to be interested in horse racing. In 1869, the artist drew a large amount of Degas pastel paintings, majority of them are about beach. In early 1870s, Degas was fond of drawing ballet dancers very much. Since 1880, his vision began to decrease. So he turned to create sculptures and wax crayon paintings with lower requirement of vision. Now, the price of some of Degas ballet has reached 16 million dollars. Several of paintings Degas may be seen at the Luxembourg Gallery, to which they were bequeathed, among a collection of impressionist pictures, by M. Caillebotte [1848-1894]. In 1880 he showed his powers of observation in a set of Portraits of Criminals, and Edgar Degas attempted modeling in a Dancer, in wax.

The most famous ballet Degas are The Bellelli Family , The Dance Class , L'Absinthe . So, oil painting lovers are very interested in Edgar Degas bio, and reproductions of his paintings for sale in gallery are prevalent. Analysis of Painting by Degas Edgar Degas ballet subjects were increasingly painted by the artist since 1870. Backstage or rehearsal were shown in many paintings of Degas Dancers, the painter emphasized their professionals in doing a job. L’Absinthe and Singer with a Glove are examples of paintings by Edgar Degas who began to paint café life. Degas Dancer artwork was highly ambiguous due to hinted at narrative content. The subject matter of Degas paintings changed so that his technique changed, too. The painting by Degas Place de la Concorde imparted a sense of movement and called as snapshots, in which the lack of color can be said to link with his interest, e.g. the 1874 Degas Ballet Rehearsal on Stage and the 1876 The Ballet Instructor.

The Orchestra of the Opera (1868–69) is another example, depicting fourteen musicians, one of them is in an orchestra pit, only the legs and tutus of the Degas dancers onstage can be seen above the musicians who were cropped by the edge of the artwork. Edgar Degas neglected etching for ten years till the mid-1870s, his changes in media engendered paintings Degas. As painted in After the Bath, women drying themselves with towels, combing their hair, and bathing are themes of Degas art drawings and paintings. Artist use strokes to draw the form of Edgar Degas Dancer and ballerinas in simplified backgrounds more freely than before. These paintings by Degas use the techniques of Impressionism, they're painted after the heyday of the Impressionist movement and late in Edgar Degas life. The Dance Class (La classe de danse) 85×75cm 1873-1876 The painter paid attention to the colors and motions in the picture which are expressed by the motions and tutus of the ballet actresses.

Degas chose a oblique point of view to expand the space, and he also used a corner of the ceiling to envelop the picture. Such a composition of Degas ballerinas is very original. Some balletdancers are practicing under the direction of their teacher. The teacher stands in the centre of Edgar Degas artwork with a crutch in her hand. In the first row, two ballet actresses are waiting their turn to dance. One of them is holding a fan while the other Edgar Degas Dancers are sitting on the piano twisting and scratching on her back. The Dance Class (La classe de danse) presents a striking contrast between the glamour of the dancing balletdancer and the inelegancy of the actresses in wait. Large amount of paintings by Degas on the scene of ballet dancing won him the title of “ painter of ballet actresses ”. At the Races Except for the scene of ballet, Degas artist created a number of horse racing paintings on canvas. He seldom depicted the on going horse racing because he concerned more about the occasional scene in the horse racing field, such as the posture of the horse and the expression of the rider in the painting of At the Races. Painter Degas was more interested in the atmosphere there.

At the Races is the most outstanding in the series of Degas horse racing oil painting. Degas Absinthe (The Absinthe Drinker or Glass of Absinthe) This Degas artwork is 92 cm × 68 cm Oil on canvas finished in 1876, it's French title is L'Absinthe, and English name is The Absinthe Drinker or Glass of Absinthe, as known much as Degas Absinthe. This painting by Degas was translated original as A sketch of a French Café and then Figures at Café, finally changed to L'Absinthe, the title the artwork is known as Absinthe Degas. Now the Musée d'Orsay in Paris collects the Edgar Degas painting permanently. Degas Absinthe depicts a woman and man sitting at the center and right. The man looks to the right, while the woman stares vacantly downward and a glass of greenish liquid sitting before her. The Degas art is a representation work in depiction of the social isolation due to rapid growth in Paris. Absinthe Degas was showing at first in 1876 and was panned by critics, they said that the painting is ugly and disgusting.

In 1893 after change the title to L'Absinthe, the Edgar Degas artwork was shown again in England and burned a sparked controversy. English critics said that the persons in the Degas Absinthe were degraded and uncouth, a warning lesson against wine and the French in general through this piece of Absinthe Degas by these critics. The paintings of Edgar Degas was regarded as a blow to morality during the show. Artwork by Edgar Degas - Ballet Dancers, (1877) | Drawing | pastel and gouache over monotype | Artstack - art online Edgar Degas (1,397 artworks, 11,808 followers) Edgar Degas (US /deɪˈɡɑː/ or UK /ˈdeɪɡɑː/; born Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas, French: [ilɛːʁ ʒɛʁmɛ̃ ɛdɡaʁ də ɡɑ]; 19 July 1834 – 27 September 1917) was a French artist famous for his paintings, sculptures, prints, and drawings.

He is especially identified with the subject of dance; more than half of his works depict dancers. He is regarded as one of the founders of Impressionism, although he rejected the term, preferring to be called a realist. He was a superb draftsman, and particularly masterly in depicting movement, as can be seen in his rendition of dancers, racecourse subjects and female nudes. His portraits are notable for their psychological complexity and for their portrayal of human isolation.At the beginning of his career, Degas wanted to be a history painter, a calling for which he was well prepared by his rigorous academic training and close study of classic art. In his early thirties, he changed course, and by bringing the traditional methods of a history painter to bear on contemporary subject matter, he became a classical painter of modern life. Edgar Degas: Impressionist Figure Painter Impressionism, Early History . Introduction One of the key figures of modern French painting , the shy, haughty Edgar Degas was one of the core members of the Impressionism art movement although he preferred to be associated with Realism .

Strongly influenced by the great Old Masters, notably J.A.D.Ingres (17801867), he is renowned above all for his outstanding figure painting , and is best known for his studies of ballerinas. His portraits, too, are exemplary, and some - like Portrait of a Young Woman (1867, Musee d'Orsay, Paris) - bridge the gap between classical tradition and modern art , in a manner similar to those of the great Russian realist Ivan Kramskoy (18371887). Unlike other Impressionist painters including Monet, Pissarro, Sisley and to a lesser extent Renoir, he had no interest in plein air painting and preferred the calm, composed atmosphere of the studio to the thoughtless spontaneity of outdoor work. He worked in various media including, oils, watercolours, pastels and bronze sculpture. Although recognized as one of the best genre painters , he also produced numerous history paintings, portraits, still lifes and even landscapes.

His best works include: Race Horses in front of the Stands (1866-8); The Bellelli Family (1858-67); The Ballet Class (1874, Musee d'Orsay, Paris); L'Absinthe (1875, Musee d'Orsay); Women Ironing (1884); Woman Combing Her Hair (1887-90); The Blue Dancers (1899, Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow); and the bronze sculpture Little Fourteen-Year-Old Dancer (1879, original is now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York). Many of Degas' paintings are now available as prints in the form of poster art. For a list of the highest prices paid for works of art by famous painters: Top 20 Most Expensive Paintings . Early Life Hilaire Germain Edgar Degas was born in Paris, into an art-loving family. His father was a wealthy banker and his mother was an American from New Orleans.

He started painting seriously early on in life and at the age of 18 turned a room in the family home into a studio, making copies of art works in the Louvre . However, his father expected him to study law, which he did so for a year, before giving up his studies to join the Ecole des Beaux-Arts . It was around this time that he met the renowned Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres who advised him to "draw lines young man, many lines". At the Ecole, he studied drawing under Louis Lamothe, who placed emphasis on traditional academic art especially draftsmanship. He furthered his studies with a 3-year trip to Italy, where he spent all his time painting copies of Renaissance masterpieces by Raphael, Michelangelo and Titian. He was influenced also by the German realist history painter (and closet-Impressionist) Adolph Menzel (1815-1905). History Paintings and Family Portraits Returning to Paris in 1859, he completed a number of historical works in a quasi-orthodox style.

This was because, like Menzel, Degas' early ambition was to be a historical painter: it was only in his early 30s that he changed course and began to specialize in genre-painting. Typical examples of his history painting at this time include: Young Spartans Exercising (1860, National Gallery, London); Semiramis Building Babylon (1861, Louvre, Paris) and War Scene from the Middle Ages (1865, Louvre). The preparatory drawings that he made for these paintings, however - studies of draperies and nudes, such as Standing Nude (1865, Louvre) - already display a confident, vigorous graphic line. In particular, they demonstrate a thorough mastery of the lesson of J.A.D.Ingres, whom Degas, throughout his life, held to be the greatest painter of his age. At the same time he started painting portraits of families and friends, combining a classical and romantic style, while revealing great qualities of simplicity (see for instance: Rene Degas with an Inkwell (1855) Smith College, Northampton, Massachusetts).

In fact this remarkable series of family pictures, painted between 1858 and 1870, are also close in spirit to Ingres in their association of a sense of reality with the concept of ideal beauty. His portraits of Therese Degas, Duchess Morbilli (c.1863, Louvre) and of a slender, serious Giulia Bellellin (1867, Louvre), have a delicate psychological depth and certain charm. Moreover, his studies for the Therese Degas portrait, complete with Ingres-like drawing and delicate colouring - in pastel and oils - of the various other figures in the portrait, are among the most harmonious compositions he ever produced. Contemporary Genre Paintings In 1862, while copying a Velazquez in the Louvre, he met the celebrated Edouard Manet (1832-83), who introduced him to a group of young progressive artists centred around Claude Monet (1840-1926).

Although he became a member of this so-called group, Degas felt that he had little in common with these (Impressionist) painters, most of whom preferred to paint outdoors - a habit he had little time for. Even so, it was largely due to their influence, that over the next few years he gave up historical painting altogether and focused on more contemporary genre paintings of horse racing, ballet, cafes and street scenes. His development found critical outlet in the theories of Louis-Emile Duranty, whose article on "The New Painting" echoed his interest in Baudelaire's modernism and in unconventional subjects - for example the world of the turf and the theatre - highly coloured and artificial settings with which his social life had already made him familiar - see for instance: Gentleman Race: Before the Departure (1862, Musee d'Orsay); Racehorses and Jockeys in front of the Stands (1869-72, Musee d'Orsay); At the Racecourse in the Country (1870-3, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston). Very soon he became interested in the dance and in opera.

He painted the Portrait of Mademoiselle Fiocre in the Ballet, 'La Source' (1866-8, Brooklyn Museum), an odd, almost Symbolist painting, with an acid turquoise in the dancer's dress, and followed this with The Dance Foyer at the Opera (1872, Louvre), with its pale blue-greys and yellows. It was during this period that he introduced new and original effects in his composition, which was now often asymmetrical - see The Orchestra of the Opera (1868-9, Louvre). He also employed traces of the Japanese style then in fashion - see Woman with Chrysanthemums (1865, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York). In 1870 he enlisted in the National Guard during the Franco-Prussian war, which meant he did not have much time to paint. After the war, he took a trip with his brother Rene to see his mother's family in New Orleans. One famous work from this time is his realist composition known as The Cotton Exchange (1873, The Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University), which received favourable reviews back in France. He returned to Paris in 1873.

His father died the following year, and Degas inherited considerable wealth. However, his brother had amassed enormous business debts, so Degas was forced to sell everything to avoid bringing scandal to the family name. For the first time ever, he became wholly reliant on selling his art for income. He was now worried about money and became more ill-tempered and pessimistic than ever. In spite of this misanthropy he was fond of Manet and Gustave Moreau (1826-1898) and proved a helpful friend to the sculptor Albert Bartholome on the death of his wife, Perie de Fleury. Impressionism In 1874 Degas, along with Monet's band of progressive painters decided to organise their own group exhibition, outside of the strict confines of the highly conservative Salon . It opened on the second floor of 35 Boulevard des Capucines, in Paris. Degas showed 10 paintings, compared to Monet (5 paintings, 7 sketches), Renoir (6 paintings), Berthe Morisot (9 paintings), Cezanne (3 paintings), Pissarro and Alfred Sisley (5 landscapes each).

Surprisingly, the group - christened "Impressionists", after Monet's composition Impression: Sunrise - was met with derision, both by the critics and the public and the show made a loss. (See Impressionist Exhibitions Paris .) Little did anyone realize that within a generation Impressionism would be a world famous art style, and that Impressionist paintings would be snapped up by art collectors from Boston to Moscow. Degas' own paintings from this time include: Race Horses (c.1866, Musee d'Orsay), Young Woman Standing Next to a Table (c.1867, Musee des Beaux-Arts, Algiers), Portrait of Monsieur and Madame Edouard Manet (c.1868, Municipal Museum of Art, Kitakyushu, Japan) and Woman Ironing (c.1869, Neue Pinakothek, Munich). Technically Degas differed from the other Impressionists because he never adopted the Impressionist name, and avoided plein air painting . As he said himself, "no art was ever less spontaneous than mine.

What I do is the result of reflection and of the study of the Old Masters ." Despite this, his subject matter (scenes of Parisian life), his composition (often off-centre), his experimentation with vivid colour , and his friendship with key Impressionist artists including Manet, all bring him within the fold of the Impressionist school. (See also: Characteristics of Impressionist Painting .) And indeed he continued to exhibit regularly with the Impressionists until 1886, after which time he allowed his entire output to be handled by his faithful dealers, in particular Paul Durand-Ruel (1831-1922). See also: Impressionists Renoir, Sisley, Pissarro, Degas, Cezanne . The New Realism of Photography Impressionist or realist, Degas (like Manet and the later Toulouse-Lautrec) stubbornly resisted the cult of the countryside, along with the Impressionist dogma of painting out of doors, directly from the subject.

Although he visited the Cafe Guerbois - a favourite meeting place of painters and other artists - until 1870, and afterwards the Cafe de las Nouvelle-Athenes - where he enjoyed meeting Manet, Zola and Cezanne - Degas was never really interested in naturalism , or in depicting fleeting changes in light. Instead, he became fascinated with movement and sought to translate the bizarre new realism of photography into the medium of painting . See in particular his exquisite ballet paintings, including: Ballet Rehearsal on the Set (1874, Musee d'Orsay), Dance Class (1874, Musee d'Orsay), Dancing Examination (1874, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York), The Star (1876, Musee d'Orsay) and Dancers Practising at the Bar (1876, Metropolitan Museum of Art). See also: Impressionist Group Splits . Later Years As he became older, he often left large sections of his paintings slightly unfinished. He blamed an eye condition for this, although his contemporaries were to point out that anyone with 'inadequate vision' could hardly have executed such wonderful paintings.

For all his artistic developments, some habits remained constant. For example, he always preferred to work in his studio and figure drawing remained his primary interest. He painted very few landscapes in his time. He was a careful artist, and always planned his works impeccably, with a precise palette - (see also 19th century colour palette ). After about 1880, his preferred medium became pastel in his sketching of ballet dancers and milliners, mainly from memory of earlier works, and his portrait art more or less ceases. In 1881 he exhibited his now famous Little Dancer, a bronze sculpture. Towards the end of his life, as his eyesight began to fail, he turned more and more to sculpture , modelling figures and horses. He became quite wealthy during his career and amassed such a large collection of art that he considered owning a private museum to house it. Instead, it was auctioned off after his death. He died a lonely old man at the age of 83. Most of his friends were already dead. Degas the Artist Degas's art , in fact, does give an extraordinary sense of fleeting impressions, but it is also reflective, built-up, seeking perfection and depth.

Above all, Degas cared for line; his swift, precise drawings show his remarkable skill and his feeling for movement, analysed and projected in a single sweep of the pencil (the Louvre has some exciting series of studies, and the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris several sketchbooks.) In order to break up the lack of movement in his canvases, he used off-centre compositions, raised the line of the horizon, overturned perspective and indulged in compositions which are often cut off abruptly by the frame. He also turned his mind quite often to photography, and practiced it himself. But he loved exploiting in his compositions the dazzle of artificial light, which emphasized forms (see Miss La-La at the Cirque Fernando, Paris (1879) National Gallery, London). In his oil painting and pastel works, which became more frequent after 1880, the tones were brilliant blues, rich reds and oranges; and the monochrome planes shimmered from the few brushstrokes of pure colour that enlivened them. Degas probed restlessly, tirelessly trying out each pose and each subject again and again.

He rejected Symbolism , which meant escape, and the aestheticism of Art Nouveau , which he found decadent. He was a sharp observer of everyday life. His famous dancers are above all ethereal, childish creatures, transfigured by the phosphorescent gleam of the footlights (see Ballet Rehearsal on the Stage (1874) Louvre). They are suspended, coloured arabesques, but they are also, paradoxically, stupid little urchins exhausted by the monotony of rehearsals, resting, stretching, adjusting their hair or their clothes with clumsy movements, whey-faced and splay-footed (See Dancers in the Wings (1890-5) City Art Gallery, St Louis, Missouri). In fact, Degas was not seeking any seductive grace in the ballet. He liked absurd positions best, and unlikely-looking feats of balance. His eye was even more pitiless when he looked at women at their toilet. He watched them at length, in the bath, getting out of the bath, soaping themselves, rubbing themselves, washing neck, leg or torso (see The Bath (c.1890) Chicago Art Institute).

He showed them in detail, caught them at moments when they might think themselves alone, crouching animal-like, grotesquely busy with intimate care of themselves, scratching themselves. Many of these works are exhibited in pastel (see After the Bath (1885) MoMA, New York; or Woman Combing her Hair (1887-90) Louvre). Degas's vision was no more indulgent when he looked at working-class women or the cafe world. He painted subjects of which Zola approved, but not in the Realist manner of Courbet . His Women Ironing (1884, Louvre), his laundresses and seamstresses, his young milliner crouched over the table making a hat, make no moral or political statement: they merely evoke, in a masterly way, a moment in the lives of ordinary people. These works are notable for their bold composition and violent use of colour, as exemplified by the three hats in At the Milliner's (1881, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York), standing out against an orange wall. See also: Impressionist Painting Developments .

In 1876, Degas painted In a Cafe (also known as The Absinthe Drinker), a portrait of Marcellin Desboutin and the actress Ellen Andree sitting at a table in the Cafe de la Nouvelle-Athenes, motionless and haggard in their distress. It was the only "wretched" picture of his career, and was strongly criticized when it was exhibited in Paris and London in 1893. In his Evening; women on the Terrace of a Cafe (1887, Louvre) the monkey-like faces of the women are set against the winkling background of the boulevard. The same use of light paint is found in the Cafe-Concert at the Ambassadeurs (1876-7, Lyons Museum) in which the singer stands out among the lamps. Degas also depicts the circus, the excitements of the Bourse (Stock Exchange), and even brothels in a set of masterly monotypes, some of which examine light and shade more completely than any of his other works.

Like his delicate In the Luxembourg Gardens (1876-80, Montpellier Museum), several attractive studies show that this middle-class Parisian also loved landscapes; in these pictures he omitted detail in order to express only a poetic, meditative calm. In 1869 he produced a series of bare seascapes in pastel, then about 1890, a number of monotypes drawn from memory of valleys and broad meadows. Legacy Degas' art, ceaselessly renewed, and with an innovatory realism, strongly influenced his contemporaries. He had no formal pupils, but he went on to influence a generation of other artists including Jean-Louis Forain (painter, lithographer/illustrator), Mary Cassatt (leader of American Impressionism ), and Walter Sickert (leader of the English Impressionists). Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901), whom Degas defended from the beginning of his career, inherited the artist's taste for drawing and his sharp observation of Parisian life.

The French and Belgian academic realists took from him his subject matter, and sometimes - as in the case of the society portraitist Giovanni Boldini (1842-1931) - his flamboyant colour. But it was the Nabis above all, including Pierre Bonnard (1867-1947) and Edouard Vuillard (1868-1940), who were most in tune with the intimate spirit of Degas' work, with its harsh tones, and were to transpose it into a happier world. See also: Legacy of Monet's Impressionism . Works by Edgar Degas hang in the best art museums around the world, notably the Musee d'Orsay and major American galleries like the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. A collection of his sculpture can be seen in the National Gallery of Art Washington DC.  For more biographies of great artists, see Famous painters .  For more about Impressionist genre painting, see: Homepage .

ENCYCLOPEDIA OF VISUAL ARTISTS Edgar Degas - The complete works Self portrait Edgar Degas (19 July 1834 – 27 September 1917), born Hilaire-Germain-Edgar Degas (pronounced [ilɛʀ ʒɛʁmɛ̃ ɛdɡɑʀ dœˈɡɑ]), was a French artist famous for his work in painting, sculpture, printmaking and drawing. He is regarded as one of the founders of Impressionism although he rejected the term, and preferred to be called a realist. A superb draughtsman, he is especially identified with the subject of the dance, and over half his works depict dancers. These display his mastery in the depiction of movement, as do his racecourse subjects and female nudes. His portraits are considered to be among the finest in the history of art. Early in his career, his ambition was to be a history painter, a calling for which he was well prepared by his rigorous academic training and close study of classic art.

In his early thirties he changed course, and by bringing the traditional methods of a history painter to bear on contemporary subject matter, he became a classical painter of modern life.

Question: Which French artist, born in 1834 was best known for his paintings of ballet dancers?
Answer: Edgar Degas